Joao Felix is a player that Chelsea fans look at someone as “What could have been?”. The Portuguese superstar came to Stamford Bridge during Thomas Tuchel’s regime. However, the bad results from the two-time Champions League winners, plus the change in ownership, meant that Felix wouldn’t get an extended contract at Chelsea. To be fair to the right-footed player, the bad results were solely not down to him. However, the expectations he had created, he does have some portion of the blame.
Now, reports are emerging that Felix could return to Chelsea for a one-year loan. The Premier League hasn’t been immune to comebacks recently, as the world saw the return of Cristiano Ronaldo to Manchester United in 2021. In the same year, Romelu Lukaku returned to Chelsea after eight years. However, as we saw with both examples, many returns don’t usually get the fairytale ending. For Felix, the ending wouldn’t be any different.
Chelsea’s initial disaster
As we had said earlier, Chelsea bought Joao Felix on loan in the 2022/23 season. In most of his time with the Blues, all the 24-year-old was doing was collecting his wages without adding any output for the team. In 20 games across all competitions, Felix only scored four goals. This was his lowest output regarding goals for the season since he started his top-tier career.
To be fair to Felix, the 2022/23 season was one of the most volatile seasons in any Premier League club’s history. That season, Chelsea sacked two managers, Thomas Tuchel and Graham Potter. Their third manager was Frank Lampard, who was kept as an interim for the season. Under Lampard, who was returning to a club he previously played and coached, Chelsea produced the worst results, including losing seven consecutive Premier League games.
Exposed at Barcelona
Despite the poor results at Atletico Madrid and Chelsea, many fans defended Felix’s reputation online. They believed that both clubs had a module based on quality defense, which didn’t allow talented attacking players to show their talent. Hence, a move to Barcelona gave them a ray of hope, considering the Catalans have always traditionally had a module of possession-based football.
However, Barcelona’s performance didn’t improve much. Considering the possession the Catalans used to have, many fans can argue that his performances regressed as he wasn’t able to take advantage. Felix scored 10 goals in 44 games across all competitions for Barcelona. It gave him a goal contribution of 22.3% of his games for Barca, which was only 2.3% higher than what it was at Chelsea.
Conclusion
Joao Felix has also been linked to Manchester United and Aston Villa this season. Villa, in particular, has been interested in signing the 24-year-old to boost its squad for the UEFA Champions League. However, based on the recent results across three different clubs, both of those clubs should walk away from this deal.
Manchester United, in particular, has seen so many highly talented players walk through the doors and fail. If Felix cannot make it count at Atletico Madrid and Chelsea, who are smaller in size and dimension than United, what makes them think that the 24-year-old will do wonders at Old Trafford? It’s only up to the player whether he has the ambition to become a successful player again or not.
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